


Pilgrim's Progress

by drivingsideways



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 5+1 Things, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Divergence, Fix It, Fluff, M/M, Post canon, Post-Episode: s15e20 Carry On, Romance, mostly S4-S8
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:47:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28260405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drivingsideways/pseuds/drivingsideways
Summary: He shouldn't.If that mook Zachariah's little thought experiment had taught him anything, it should have been this- that Cas was off limits.That he shouldn't keep finding ways to keep him close.He shouldn't keep finding ways to kiss Cas, but that's exactly what he does.ORFive times that Dean and Cas kissed and didn't talk about it....plus the one time they kissed and still didn't talk about it.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 10
Kudos: 73





	Pilgrim's Progress

**Author's Note:**

> Based off [this tumblr post](https://breha.tumblr.com/post/637970611368542208/if-you-could-insert-one-dean-and-cas-kissed-once)

**Five.**

It's not like Dean hasn't thought about it before.

That first month after he crawled his way out of his grave? He'd never told Sam or Bobby, but that entire month, hell, more like three, he'd been convinced that it was all just one of Alastair's tricks. That Alastair had moved on from the crude, visceral pleasure of blood and guts and shredded flesh to this—letting him _dream_ , and then, right when he'd let himself believe it, that the impossible had happened, Alastair would take it away.

The sick fuck.

But two could play that game, alright?

Dean- Dean was good at this. Dean _knew_ Alastair, like calling to like in the putrid depths of hell. Dean would find a way to trip him up, it was like that time with the djinn. Find the thing that didn't fit, the thing that was impossible to explain, and then tug at that thread until it all unravelled.

Well, he didn't have to look too far.

Castiel, angel of the Lord, who made his ears bleed, and his stomach swoop—well— come the _fuck_ on, there was no possible way _his_ mind could have generated _this_. This was _Alastair_ , through and through, Alastair who had put him on the rack and taken more pieces out of him than he'd known existed, who'd worked him over and over and _over,_ and somewhere along the way learnt enough about Dean that he'd—

The handprint buzzed and ached and tingled and Castiel's blue, blue eyes had looked right through him, and said things like _you don't think you deserve to be saved,_ and _if I tell you something, will you keep it a secret, I'm not a hammer,_ and no, _this_ would not be the thing he let himself believe, _this_ would not be one more way that Alastair broke him. In the backseat of his car, Anna had fitted her palm onto the scar, her delicate, smooth palm too small for it, the whorls of her fingers caressing the edges, and it had been _electric,_ and all _wrong_ , because it wasn't _her_ mark that Dean carried on his friggin' re-hymenated body (it wasn't _her_ who had gripped him tight and raised him from perdition, and Dean's body knew it in a way that Dean wasn't going to think about, let alone—)

That sonuva _bitch_ Alastair would not break him with a fairy tale that innocent people told their children, _angels watch over you_ , but his mother had not been innocent in all of this, had she, she had sold Sammy to the Devil, and Castiel had laid a hand on his shoulder (but had not touched his mark, why hadn't—) and had looked at Dean with something like _sorrow_ , and didn't seem to mind when Dean called him _Cas_ , brought him down to his level, and _fuck_ , here he was again, out of options, out of luck, out of fuel, and his brother was someone he didn't recognize.

The sickest thing was how _that_ was the part that had felt _real_ , felt painful in a way that Alastair could have never devised. Dean's _soul_ was putting himself in the hands of a demon bitch, and there was fuck all that Dean could do about it. This was how he broke then, in the words of a prayer, the first he'd ever said, and he hadn't known whom he was praying to, but it had been Cas who showed up, eyes bluer than any summer sky Dean had ever seen, face striated by the colours of a vending machine, and said, _faith is a good sign, Dean. W_ hat was it a sign of, Dean would have liked to know, and it wasn't faith, not by a long shot, but what could a creature like _Castiel_ have known of desperation? Castiel who stood close, too close, but had touched him only twice, who'd said, _it's not blame that rests on you, it's fate,_ and yeah, that was fucking _Winchester Gospel_ for you, cursed from the start, the two of them, before they were in the womb, born under a bad sign.

But Cas had helped, and Dean had begun to think—but of course, Cas left, and there was only poor, stupid Jimmy Novak, and then Cas was back, but not really, Cas was a stranger, and Dean didn't know when he'd stopped thinking of Cas as a stranger, and just, _strange_ —

Dean had laid one across Castiel's marble-face that didn't shatter, _tried_ , because what else could he have done? _This is real, this is the only thing that's worth it_ and even before the disappointment of having Cas leave could sink in, the handprint had buzzed and ached and tingled as Cas pressed him against a wall and pressed a palm against his lips and then bled on the floor, _for Dean_ , (whom he didn't serve) and Cas had said _, I'll hold them all off_ , go save him, but of course it had been too late, because that was the story of Dean's life, too late, too late.

Cas comes back, and oh look, Cas has learnt what desperation means, after all. There's something wild in his eyes, that he tries to hide but doesn't succeed when he says, _we need God_ , _it's not theological, it's strategic,_ and if Dean had a moment to take a breath, he would have wanted to sit Cas down, and say, listen man, I understand it, but this is a road to nowhere, you're only going to waste your time, you gotta stop loving what can't love you back, and yeah, that'd have been hypocritical of him, but so what, that was pretty low down on Dean's laundry list of sins.

But it's the Apocalypse, and as it happens Dean's got his own shit to deal with, and Cas isn't his responsibility, so what if he just died for Dean or whatever, alright, Dean owes him, but not like _that_.

And now it's the end of the world, their last night on earth, and Dean's not too late to make Cas smile at him, confused but fond, and Castiel's smile is nothing like Jimmy Novak's. _Cas_ is nothing like Jimmy Novak who'd just been a naive man in an ugly suit, and well. He'd promised Cas a good time, and Dean's not got a lot to give Cas, by way of thanks or comfort or _anything_ , and what had Cas said that time _? Everything on earth is pain_ , but that's only cause he doesn't _know,_ the good parts, the _best_ parts, and before Dean can chicken out of it, he's pressing Cas up against the Impala, and Cas is _letting_ him, goes willing, pliant, staring at him, eyes wide, and Dean sees the moment it happens, the small hitch of breath he takes, that _Cas_ , who doesn't _need_ to breathe makes, and his eyes dart to Dean's lips and flash up again, and Dean's kissing him, and it's—riding a comet—

Cas doesn't know how to kiss.

But that's fine, that's a-ok, because _Dean_ does, and Dean can _show_ him, and Cas is a quick learner, zero to six hundred in twenty seconds or less, and now it's Dean who can't breathe except in loud, panting gasps, Cas's warm, strong hand wrapped with his around their dicks, not enough slick, a little too rough, too painful, perfect, _perfect_ , and Cas is _eating_ his face, teeth sharp and painful on Dean's lips, eyes still wide open and unblinking, the _freak_ , but his gaze is hot and ferocious, and Dean's eyes flutter shut again on a moan, because Dean's burning, has been burning all this time, he realizes, for this, for—

Cas _rips_ his sleeve off, jacket and shirt, both gone, and then his hand is _there_ , and Dean's coming, wet, thick and nasty all over an angel's hand, he should be going to hell for this, except Cas hadn't let him stay there, and hadn't thrown him back, and _this_ was real, Dean shuddering, face hidden in the crook of Cas' neck, trembling, his knees giving way, but Cas' got him, the hand on his shoulder slipping lower, around his back to hold him up, holding him in _place_ , and Dean should— he should—

**Four.**

He wakes up alone in a motel room, and there is a tomorrow, and then the day after, but no Cas, and then there is two thousand fucking fourteen, and Cas is still there in the ruins that Sam and Dean made of the world , _jesus fucking christ on a candy stick,_ Cas is still _there_.

Cas is broken _,_ because _Dean_ did that to him, and Cas kisses him, once, open mouthed and filthy, and then draws back and says, _the day I decide to stay, make sure I don't, please, if you ever cared even a little, promise me_ , and then Cas goes off to die with even-more-of-an-asshole-future-him, because that's just how he rolls.

**Three.**

He shouldn't.

If that mook Zachariah's little thought experiment had taught him anything, it should have been this- that Cas was off limits.

That he shouldn't keeping finding ways to keep him close.

He shouldn't keep finding ways to kiss Cas, but that's exactly what he does.

The world's ending around them in slow motion and they are fucking.

They're fucking in dank, stinking alleys, blood running down Dean's chin, and Cas licking it up, and feeding it back to him, tongue practically molesting Dean's tonsils, fingers squeezing his neck, rubbing against each other fully clothed, until Dean's coming in his pants. They're fucking on stained bedsheets of grimy hotel rooms, lights flickering, crackling, every electronic instrument in a five mile radius gone haywire, the smell of ozone and jizz making Dean dizzier, as Cas pounds him through four successive orgasms, each more spectacular and painful than the last, Dean's body a limp rag after. They're fucking squeezed together in the backseat of the Impala, Dean hunched over Cas, occasionally knocking his head on the roof, but he can't stop, _won't_ stop, nothing has felt this good, a thick fat dick inside him, filling up his empty places, and Cas slack-mouthed, and eyes closed under him, hands wrapped around Dean's biceps so tight that Dean's gotta wear long sleeves through the hottest summer in three centuries, so that Sammy won't ask.

Sam knows, of course he does.

Cas isn't subtle when he turns up, dishevelled, hair sticking out in five different directions, looking pissed off and tired; shrinking, somehow, but still with that crackling power about him, and not looking at anyone or anything except at Dean, like all the roads he's taken looking for God have only led him straight back to Dean. Sam's taken to clearing his throat awkwardly, and hot-footing it out of hearing range the moment Cas appears, and just as well, Dean doesn't have it in him anymore to be quiet, sprawled wide open on the bed, hands twisting in the sheets as Cas fucks him _fuck, fuck, fuck, jesus_ _fuck_ , if he hadn't already gone to hell, surely this would send him there, profaning this holy thing of god, whose tongue was made for songs of praise and worship, and is instead all the way up Dean's ass, dragging an orgasm out of him.

It's alright, he reasons, on the days Cas is gone, and Sam is there, but _gone_.

Cas and him, they're not so different after all. They're both the disappointing sons of deadbeat dads, and Cas is losing his wings and his faith at approximately the same speed that Dean's losing everything and everyone, and the world is going to hell in a handbasket, and there's no way to fix it, no way to undo it, and he's going to have to kill the love of his life, and if this is his consolation prize, he's going to take it.

(Dean loves _taking_ it.)

Dean will take it and he doesn't want to talk about it, and hey, apparently, neither does Cas, so that's peachy, that's perfect, and Dean shouldn't, but he does, and Cas lets him, and he does, right until Sam gets thrown into the pit, and Dean doesn't.

Cas' grace knits him together, once more, and then he's gone, and so is Dean.

**Two.**

Cas comes back.

But he's more of a stranger than he'd ever been, even in that barn, what feels like a lifetime ago, and he won't talk, and sure as fuck won't listen, and his blue gaze when it meets Dean's is cool as lake water, as if Dean doesn't know what Cas sounds like, strung out of his mind with pleasure, from having Dean hold him down with a binding sigil and fuck him raw.

As if they'd never been friends, and perhaps they hadn't, that was just what it was like in the war, and the war was over, and so were they.

Cas is all impatience, and anger, and sullen resentment, brittle in a way that scares Dean if he really thinks about it, because it's _Cas_ , and something's wrong, Dean can feel it deep in his bones, just like he knew with Sammy, but he—

Look, if Cas wants to reach him, he knows how to call.

But then it's too late (again) and there's a war (again, or it was never over, why is it never over), only this time it's _Cas_ that Dean needs to kill, _really_ kill, and fuck if he knows how, but in the end, all he can do is watch as Cas walks into the water, and all that's left of him is a stained, torn trenchcoat.

Dean keeps it.

He can't look at it, can't stand to, that entire year, but he keeps it.

And then Cas comes back (again), but then he's _gone_ (again) and what had Dean expected, really?

And Dean's tired, ok, so tired, so tired and sick and done, and the war is still on—maybe he shouldn't have left Cas, maybe he should have tried harder, maybe _he_ should have called, maybe it wouldn't have all gone to shit, if Dean hadn't screwed it up once again, hadn't _failed_ —

"Cas" he says, squinting against the sun on his face, up at where Cas is perched on the roof of the Impala. "Why are you covered in bees?"

The air is filled with a humming that Dean's only 90% certain are the bees.

"They like me, Dean," says Cas, as though that were a reasonable explanation, and fuck knows, maybe it was, in that fucked up noodle of his. "They wanted me to stay with them."

Shit, fuck.

Dean rubs his hands over his eyes.

"You maybe want to come inside and talk?"

Crazy or not, they needed all the help they could—

Cas hops down from the car, and the bees rise up in an angry, buzzing cloud before settling back.

"Lose the bees first", says Dean, and then regrets it, when Cas stands before him naked as a new-born.

"Dude!" yelps Dean, "Come on! Where the fuck are your clothes?"

"I—", says Cas, sounding lost and forlorn as he stares down at himself. "I'm not sure. The bees didn't like them."

And fuck, like this, Dean can see that Cas is just skin and bone, pale skin stretched over prominent ribs, hip bones jutting out—

"Well, mojo them back from wherever you left them", Dean growls, "There's a sandwich in it for you."

Cas looks up, hopeful.

"Peanut butter?"

"Sure", says Dean and hopes to god the vending machine has something that resembles a sandwich. "But get some.." he waves his hands, not looking at Cas, because it _hurts_ to see him like this.

There's nothing like a sandwich in the machine, so he ends up instructing Cas to wait for him in the room while he makes a quick run to the nearest store. He picks up some orange juice and bananas while he's at it, along with the bread, peanut butter and jam.

"This is very kind of you, Dean" says Cas, as he sits (fully clothed, in his hospital scrubs and trenchcoat), his hands in his lap.

"So, what, you need to eat these days?" Dean queries. "You look like you've just spent six months on a fad diet".

Cas looks away, up at the ceiling.

"The grace is more useful for other things" he says, "There's so much to do. So many creatures in pain. I forget to."

"Listen", starts Dean, because he can guess where this is coming from, hell, it isn't like—

"Is my sandwich ready?"

Dean slides it across the table, and watches as Cas wolfs it down.

There's a bit of jam that gets stuck to the corner of his mouth, and Dean gestures at it, and then, when Cas looks confused, reaches out to—

Cas flinches.

Dean freezes, hand stuck awkwardly in mid-air, throat closing up.

He leans back, withdrawing his hand.

"You've got some jam smeared at the corner of your mouth, like a goddamned three year old, Cas".

"Oh", says Cas, and it vanishes.

Dean swallows the _guess you don’t mind wasting your mojo on that then,_ that sits on his tongue, and Cas finishes his sandwich, suddenly quiet, staring down at his sandwich, though it wasn't like he'd been saying anything before, but it's a different sort of quiet between them now, filled with all the things that Dean wants to scream at him, and can't.

Cas doesn't touch the bananas, but slurps the orange juice, loudly.

Dean watches as Cas licks his lips, tongue darting out to taste the last of it.

When he looks up, Cas is looking at him.

He feels his cheeks heat, caught out.

"You’re sweet", says Cas, suddenly. "Sweeter than all the honey in the world".

And before Dean can process it, he leans forward, brushing his lips against Dean's; a butterfly of a kiss, and then he's gone, in a quiet whoosh, and Dean's left alone, and when he wets his suddenly parched lips, he can taste the faint bitter-sour flavour of canned orange on them.

**One**

Well, Dean's not making the same mistake twice.

There's no way he's gonna leave Cas behind.

 _Where's the angel,_ he asks, as he hacks his way through Purgatory, _where's the angel_?

 _Cas_ , he prays, _c'mon man. Don't do this to me._

 _Cas_ , _please_.

Once he gets slashed by something, some kind of hellbreed that seemed half werewolf, half vampire, and it's pretty bad, but somehow he manages to lose them, holed up high up in cave he'd discovered in some time ago. The view's spectacular from the ridge or would be, if the hills and valleys and forests weren't teeming with things that were out for his blood, and Cas'.

He manages the staunch the bleeding. The gash isn't too deep after all, but he's gonna have to stay put for a couple of days. But then the chills start, and he thinks, shit, shit. Starting a fire is a sure way to get killed, no way he's gonna be able to take on anything more dangerous than a field mouse right now, and fuck, he's _exhausted_ , suddenly, and ok, this wasn't good, the ground seemed to be rushing up to meet his face—

He's warm.

Cocooned in the softest of embraces, safe, untouchable.

"Mom?" he whispers, "Is that you?"

A hand brushes over his forehead, light and gentle.

He struggles to open his eyes, which seem to be refusing to cooperate.

It's not mom.

"Cas" he rasps, bleary eyed, throat drier than a desert. "Cas?"

"Shh" says Cas, "You're safe now. Rest, Dean."

And it's true, Dean can feel it, cradled here in—Cas' wings, he thinks, sleepily, unable to hold on to the thought. Those are Cas' wings he can feel, sheltering, soft, warm.

"You found me", he mumbles, "I've been looking for you."

"Shhh", Cas rumbles, "Don't talk. It's alright."

" _Cas_."

A feather light press against his mouth, and then another, and then a third.

"I'm here", Cas whispers, "Dean. Rest now."

But when he wakes up, he's alone.

If it weren't for the healed gash, skin smooth and untouched, every aching muscle restored like he'd been checked into a fancy spa for a month, he'd have been certain he dreamt it.

Then they get topside, and he wishes it had only been a dream, and not one more thing he'd have to forget.

**(One more)**

Sam's here, finally.

Bobby had been right, time sure passed different around here.

Sam's here now, and it's perfect.

Almost.

Cas isn't around.

Or he's everywhere, but nowhere where Dean can see him, reach out and touch him.

When he asks around, he gets vague answers.

Ellen says, _oh, I think Jack and Cas are in some other planetary system this week._

Two weeks later, by Dean's counting, Rufus says _, you just missed him, boy, he was here helping fix my roof not half-hour ago._

 _Jack_ says, looking embarrassed, _uh, I sent him on a mission, to, um, uh, Andromeda, and then, uh, I have to go, nice seeing you again, Dean,_ and vanishes before Dean can whup his ass for lying to his family.

Dean gets into the Impala; tells Sam he's got a supply run to make.

"You've got like a 100 cartons of beer, Dean", says Sam.

"Not beer, Sammy."

Sam gives him a long look.

Dean shrugs, look, it wasn't like Sam didn't _know._

Sam nods, once, lips quirking a little.

"Good luck, then" he says.

Dean flips a finger at him.

"C'mon, Baby" he says, as he pulls onto the road, "Take me to him."

Baby's never let him down.

Of course, Cas has gone and set his feathery ass down somewhere on the highest mountain that Dean has ever seen, the top of it half hidden in a swirl of clouds. There's only a narrow trail, no way to take Baby up, so he parks her under the shade of a leafy tree of some species he's pretty sure isn't found on earth, and shrugs off his jacket, wrapping it around his waist.

Jesus, but Cas could be a real dick, and it wasn't like Dean didn't already know that, but, _wow_.

The trail is narrow, though not very steep, and the foliage dense for most parts, as he begins to climb. There's a river or a small waterfall somewhere, he can hear the sound of it, a muted roar. Up and up it goes, through plants and shrubs- or things that look like plants or shrubs, he can't be sure of anything here, he's realized. Occasionally, a small woodland creature of indeterminate origin will cross his path. Some of them stop and stare. One or two get experimentally close, while he stands as still as possible, and lets them acclimatize themselves to his scent. The foliage isn't dense enough to block out all sunlight, and every now and again the path will emerge onto an outcrop of rock and grass, probably intended as a rest-stop for the weary. Dean's only slightly out of breath, though the air gets cooler as he goes higher. But the sun is warm enough for a sheen of sweat to form, making his t shirt stick to his spine.

He sinks down onto a convenient grassy knoll and takes a few breaths. Clouds float lazily over the valley below, that stretches out farther than his eye can see. The river he's hearing winds through it, clear and blue, through acres and acres of green and violet, and brown and red. He turns his face up toward the sky.

Was it possible to get sunburn in Heaven?

Well, he was going to find out.

He turns his head a little.

He's about half way up the mountain, he estimates.

Given the position of the sun, he's been climbing about three hours.

_Making me work for it, huh, buddy? Dick move, Cas, gotta tell you that._

Something rustles in the grass near him: a tiny grass snake, slim and green.

Snakes in paradise, wow, wasn't that theologically wrong or something?

But it gives him a beady eyed look and slithers over his outstretched palm and then away, unbothered, leaving behind a fleeting sense of dry leather.

Dean sighs.

"Cas?" he says, softly. "You're waiting for me, right?"

He doesn't know what he'll do if Cas _isn't._

The thought makes his heart triphammer in his chest, fear gripping it.

What if he was too late, again?

But he's got to believe that he's right about this.

That he's here because Cas is ready, finally, to let Dean find him.

In those years after Purgatory, they'd never managed, somehow to make it work.

Every time Cas left—every time Cas came back—it got harder, somehow, to say, don't go, please, I need you, forgive me, _stay._

Dean- he'd just become angrier and meaner, falling deeper and deeper and this was a grave that even Cas couldn't pull him out of. And then, when he'd been ready- _almost_ —that second time in Purgatory, it had seemed like _Cas_ wasn't ready, though surely, he knew, why else had he stopped Dean—

But the joke was on Dean, because Cas _hadn't_ known, and then it had been too late. Cas was slipping through his fingers one more time, beatific in his _joy_ , as he threw himself into the pit for Dean, and Dean had known, had _known_ , that it was the last time.

When it was all over, he had waited.

Hope was a thing with feathers.

He had waited for Jack to bring Cas back to them, to _Dean_.

But Jack hadn't.

No way that Jack hadn't sprung Cas from the Empty, there was just _no fucking way_ that would have happened, so that meant that Cas didn't _want_ to see Dean.

And alright, maybe Dean deserved that, maybe that was his penance, and he would do it, gladly.

He wouldn't complain, and he'd go through the rest of his life with a piece of him missing, and it was what it was, there were things you couldn't undo, there were sorrows that had to be borne. After all, he'd spent half the time he'd known Cas mourning him, it felt like.

On the bad days, after a hunt that went wrong- there were, after all, still some of those—he'd lie in bed, every tendon and muscle and bone aching, and when he closed his eyes, he'd try to will himself back there, to that cave in Purgatory, the safety and comfort of Cas' shelter, and the sweet press of his lips against Dean's.

_Sweeter than all the honey in the world._

He blinks awake.

Apparently he'd taken a nap, though given that the sun was still steadily beating down on his face—and yes, you could get sunburn in heaven, thanks for nothing Jack—it hadn't been too long.

It takes another two hours, and he's almost giving up hope, wondering whether he's going to end up just spending the night alone on this mountain after all, when he breaks through a particularly dense grove and finds himself in a middle of a garden.

The garden- in flagrant, dizzying bloom around a cobbled stone path that leads to a small wooden cabin nestled against the wall of the mountain- has an occupant.

Dean feels like his breath was punched out of him.

 _My true form is as tall as the Chrysler building_ , Cas had once said, the lying liar that he was, because he's probably _twice_ as tall. He's all iridescent wings that span twenty feet either side, and a dozen wheels spinning in different directions and something that looks like blue flames trailing the edges of his wings, and Dean is—

_Jesus._

Cas turns toward him at that, and Dean senses his-shock, and then unbearable gladness- before the almost unbearable brightness dims slowly, coalescing into a familiar shape.

"Not quite", says Cas. "Hello, Dean."

Dean's feet seem locked to the ground, and Cas doesn't make a move toward him either.

"Hey", Dean breathes out, the air rushing out of his lungs with the word. "Cas."

Cas has switched out the trenchcoat and suit for comfortable looking pair of white linen pants and a loose short tunic of sky blue, that match his eyes, and there's what looks like a week's worth of stubble along his jaw.

"Heaven can't afford a razor?" is what Dean says next, like the idiot he is.

Cas' eyes crinkle. "I've been told it makes me more attractive".

_What, who- no- fuck._

Dean's already up in Cas' space before he realizes it.

"Who told you that?" he rasps, and up close he can see the flecks of grey in the stubble, and at Cas' temples, and yes, it made him blisteringly hot, but damned if Dean was going to— "They were lying, just so you know."

Cas is smiling at him. It's not a smile that Dean has seen before, he thinks. There's no shadow of sorrow lurking just beneath.

It takes Dean's breath away.

"Dean," he says, softly.

Dean reaches out to run a finger against his jaw, going against the grain, ends up with his fingers resting lightly against Cas' cheek, just under his ear.

"You’re a dick" he says, equally soft, "you know that?"

Cas nods.

"I've been", starts Dean, and then finds he's out of words, takes a shuddery breath instead, furiously trying to blink away the wetness in his eyes.

Cas's hands cup his face, warm and sure, and he draws Dean's forehead down to his.

"I know", Cas says. "But I would do it again, Dean, if it meant I saved you. I would do it _all_ again."

Dean takes another juddering breath.

"I should have told you," whispers Dean, "All that time. I'm sorry I wasn't brave enough."

"Dean", says Cas, and there's something in his voice that reminds Dean of that first meeting in the barn, that same iron certainty. "You've always been enough."

Above them the sky starts turning a fiery orange as the first of the suns starts to set.

Cas' wings- which he hasn't tucked away- take on a metallic shine, but they feel warm, and safe, just like Dean remembers.

Dean kisses him, tenderly, the way he's always wanted to, and never let himself before.

Once, then again, then again, and again, and again.

Oh, he never wants to stop, because Cas, Cas is kissing him back, as though he doesn't want to, either.

"Sweeter than all the honey in the world", Dean whispers, glad that there's nobody to hear this but Cas.

"You don't even like honey", says Cas, after a moment, lips curving a little. "You never let Sam put any in your tea, even that time you were horribly sick with the flu."

Dean draws back.

"You don’t remember!" he accuses, genuinely horrified.

Cas' brows draw together in a frown.

"What?"

"You kissed me! And said—well, you said what you said! Back in the day when you went crazy on us!"

"Which time?"

Dean groans, thumping his head onto Cas' shoulder.

Cas buries his nose in Dean's hair and tucks him closer in his embrace.

"I remember" he confesses, after a moment. "But I thought you'd want to forget it."

"Cas", Dean, sighing, as he turns to nuzzle the skin beneath Cas' ear, placing a small kiss there, as he presses closer. "Let's never talk about this again, ok?"

**Author's Note:**

> \- Re: title, ostensible reason, from "When You Are Old" by William Butler Yeats, who will not LET ME REST. 
> 
> "How many loved your moments of glad grace,  
> And loved your beauty with love false or true,  
> But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,  
> And loved the sorrows of your changing face;
> 
> And bending down beside the glowing bars,  
> Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled  
> And paced upon the mountains overhead  
> And hid his face amid a crowd of stars."
> 
> But REAL reason: yeah it was this or a song from a Julie Andrews movie, I think I made a wise choice.
> 
> \- Kudos and comments are welcome :D 
> 
> \- If you like, [reblog on tumblr](https://drivingsideways.tumblr.com/post/638202406924140544/for-the-ever-present-julie-based-off-this-tumblr)
> 
> Also come say hi! I'm drivingsideways on tumblr and drivingsideway3 on twtr


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